I had an amazing 10-day trip to Kono, Hawaii with 12 of us from different states all convening to share this special time at Banyan Tree Sanctuary. My good friend, Shawn Gallaway, was our trip facilitator and Jan Salerno was our dolphin guide.
I enjoyed connecting with the awesome people who attended this Dolphin Tune retreat. Our morning started out with a moving chakra meditation followed by a hearty vegetarian breakfast. We all shared our stories as we got to know one another on a deep level and there was plenty of laughter to go around.
We made 4 boat trips to Honaunau Bay with Jack’s Dive Locker and started our snorkeling around 9am when the dolphins are frisky and playful. It felt like spiritual magic swimming with the dolphins in the wild! It was fascinating to have a large pod swimming below me as I watched in amazement with their beautiful bodies swimming up to the surface and then diving back down into the warm, blue sea. They appeared to love swimming along with us humans and loved to show off their flips and spins to our utter delight!
One of the highlights on this trip was swimming with the manta rays. We spotted them from the boat so we quickly grabbed our fins and snorkels to swim out to meet them. Our boat captain, Jeff, said that in the 20-years he has been leading groups, he has never witnessed manta rays swimming with snorkelers during the day.
The manta rays were feeding in a circular pattern turning onto their backs showing their white under bellies like poetry in motion. The manta ray in front gets the most fish and they take turns being the lead so that each one gets an equal share of the food. I thought how wonderful it would be if humans could adopt this sharing activity so that all people would have enough. We live in an abundant world with enough resources for all. It would be awesome if we could learn from the wisdom of these sea creatures.
I feel blessed that I was able to go on this retreat and feel a deep healing has taken place on the beautiful big island of Hawaii.